The Ground Up
by crihavoc
Summary: The best in the world - Sena has a chance to to prove he remains among the all-pro elite as he enters the League Championship. But, something else takes precedence.
1. Chapter 1

**Note: ES21** is the intellectual and publishing property of Inagaki Riichiro, Murata Yusuke and Shonen Jump.I just happened to wander onto their practice field…

"_Every time a football player goes to ply his trade he's got to play from the ground up -- from the soles of his feet right up to his head. Every inch of him has to play. Some guys play with their heads. That's OK. You've got to be smart to be number one in any business. But more importantly, you've got to play with your heart, with every fiber of your body. If you're lucky enough to find a guy with a lot of head and a lot of heart, he's never going to come off the field second."_ - V. Lombardi

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**Pregame**

He stands on a football field and watches himself – he can't help it, it's unavoidable. He was loosening his neck and glanced up above the end-zone and there was the image, bigger than the uprights on the goal post: the ball is snapped, the quarterback turns his back on the defense and drifts diagonally, arm extended… and then the ball is gone in a flurry of motion, moving lateral to the straining linemen, and the linebacker is too slow, can't seal the edge, so that the hunched blur rips across the line of scrimmage, vaulting fallen bodies and swiveling into an open space in enemy territory. There is one man to beat, the weak-side safety closing with a good angle – but a micro-second stutter-step and pivot and the man is grasping at air, his eyes haunted in disbelief, and then the _real_ speed, the break-away afterburner, punches in and the zebra arms go up… but, it's just the Jumbotron.

There is still a real game to play.

Light pours into the gigantic bowl of the stadium, tiny suns captured and anchored with struts and girders and glaring with such intensity at the field that every player moving through their warm up routines drags a menagerie of shadows with them across the grass. High quality speakers surrounding the stands pump out the latest top-forty chaff as the crowds filter in, but it is the kinetic bass that thuds across the hash-marks and yard markers and threatens to buckle adrenaline-stretched nerves on both teams. Beneath the music is the constant murmur of the fans filtering into their seats, a migration indistinct to the eye: if one were to attempt to peer through the thick moist air and the eye-filling illumination, up and out from the sunken center of the stadium, it would be to behold a dimly visible mosaic of colored shadows, interspersed with the bright novas of detonating camera flashes.

Most importantly, there is the smell – green, sweet and familiar. The fresh-mown grass of the playing field, standing fixed and constant in his memory like a torii gate anchored to his soul.

He closes his eyes and turns his face to the sky. The sound of his teammates fades away. It is raining, a cool, heavy winter rain so typical of the Florida coast in January. The downpour plasters the wild spikes of his hair to his skull, running down his neck and soaking the torn Devilbats t-shirt that he wears beneath the carapace of his pads and the blue, black and white of his Boston Saber's game jersey. The rain taps his forehead, his eyelids, and catches in the brown, black and gray hairs of his goatee. Water seeps between his lips, and the taste… the trickle touching his tongue is the same any of a hundred different rainy game days, a dozens of fields in Japan and Europe and in the States. He has a football in his hands, his gloves folded into his belt at his waist so that his bare fingers can feel the wet pebbled leather. The scent of the soaked football adds to his sense of the historical. His electric legs yearn to rip across the grass. Even with eyes shut, drifting with the charged atmosphere, he hops in place and his legs kick out and flex, restless as a race-horse at the gate.

His brown eyes open, and there is no indication in their serious depths that the monstrous spectacle enveloping him has caused the least apprehension. He tosses the football to a nearby ball boy and trots easily towards the locker room entrance, small splashes kicking up on the wet grass with every step, shadowy coterie trailing at his feet.

He jogs past a group of Saber fans, the cherished plastic rectangles of field-passes dangling from around their necks. They point at him with huge excitement. They call his name, they scream to him – one woman, yelling so loudly that saliva leaps from her mouth, pulls frantically at the shoulders of her shirt: it is a reproduction Saber game jersey that she is desperate to show off. It has his name across the shoulders, it has his number on the chest – number 21.


	2. Chapter 2

**Minutes before the team introductions.**

The crowd noise is a pervasive thrum in the background of every conversation, regular as breakers rolling across a rocky shore, even in the purportedly sound-proofed confines of the locker room. As always, the smells present just before game-time ratchet the excitement to another level – the stink of helmet-lining, pads and spikes, the musk of nervous sweat, the tang of ointments and chemical rubs, the sweet and spice of various soaps and shampoos, the fresh scent of just-laundered uniforms – a conglomeration of odors that, like the cut-grass, marks an olfactory path arrowing to his heart.

_The biggest game of the year. Just another game. Just do your job, and the guy next to you will do his._

Sena Kobayakawa could hear the voice of the Coach in his head, a matter-of-fact recitation from the final pre-game run-through at the hotel ballroom earlier in the morning, before the players had boarded buses and navigated the clogged streets to the stadium. It seemed like a week ago, instead of merely hours. Now, he sat before his locker, fully uniformed, as the final minutes counted down to game time. He forced his legs not to jitter. He turned his head, catching those eyes that searched him out and nodding with an honest confidence: the spirit of the men around him was relaxed, professional and full of eager purpose. In no small way, this was due to his influence – the "C" for captain was on his shoulder, one of the handful of core leaders that braced the club, elevating the 55-man roster up to a championship level.

Sena was thirty three years old. He had been playing American football for over half his life. Selected in the late rounds of the league draft as what the Saber front office had considered a "project with potential," he had turned the opportunity into a pro career spanning over a decade – he had galvanized the Boston fan-base with his underdog story, his earnest and devoted effort, his shaggy-haired personal style and, of course, his amazing performance between the lines. His hat rested in the bottom of his locker, near his hand. The curved surface of the eyeshield on the helmet reflected a slightly warped portrait back at him. He regarded himself, captured in the plastic, and felt strongly that his teenage self would never have recognized the man he had become. The scrawny body, the submissive demeanor… no player in the pro game could afford either. Sena had grown to his final height of 5'8", but a professional training staff, including strength coach and nutritionist, had over his career packed an incredible amount of muscle onto his body. At 190 lbs, the former errand-boy and bully-victim moved now with controlled power and graceful confidence through an athletic world populated with behemoths and muscular freaks of genetics: the elite of the elite.

There was a fraction of a percentage within the elite which marked the ultimate level – while he was no longer in his prime, there were four all-pro trophies in his home that signified his greatest achievements in the game. They stood directly beneath the framed cover from Sports Illustrated – "**Sayers, Sanders, Sproles – Sena-sama? Kobayakawa dekes his detractors in the 'best-ever' scat-back debate.**"

But, today's championship game wasn't about him. Again, mindful of his coach's words, Sena looked at the guy next to him. One locker over, lost like Sena in a few final moments of self-reflection, sat the intense figure of Seijuro Shin.


	3. Chapter 3

**Helping hands**

Sena had never expected to be the professional teammate of Shin.

Drafted by the San Antonio Armadillos earlier then many thought prudent, after finishing Ojo University and a year of semi-pro football in Japan, Shin was perhaps the shortest safety to ever make an all-pro squad – and one of the fastest. At 5'7" and 220 lbs, he had made a career of stalking ball-carriers from behind the massive pillars of his defensive linemen and the stout trees of his linebackers and striking them down with his feared trident tackle. He had leveraged his work ethic to develop superior coverage skills, nascent during his original career as a linebacker, so that neither tight ends nor wide-outs could gain any real separation from him when the ball was hiked. One all-pro season, then a second as the leading tackler in the league – Shin's profile across professional football rose like a rocket.

However, injuries were inevitable for a player who searched out contact with the commitment that Shin displayed. A serious knee injury, a nagging back issue, and reconstructive surgery on his shoulder had diminished Shin over the final three years of his contract, casting him as more of a liability in a starting role. Shin being Shin, the first offer made in the training room to introduce him to somatropin, or HGH, as an aid to accelerate healing resulted in a "bukkorosu" condition, and the hiring of a new strength and conditioning coach – this did not endear him to a large contingent of his peers.

The Armadillos had performed an evaluation on their player personnel following the end of the season and, regrettably, had made the decision to "turn the page" at the safety position. Football was a business, predicated on performance: for both on the field and off the field reasons, Shin was given an unconditional release.

This on top of Shin's already difficult situation…

Sena knew he should be continuing to focus on the playbook, reviewing his assignments and responsibilities for the twentieth time… but he continued to watch Shin out of the corner of his eye. A physique of dense marble, muscled like an avatar of Misshaku Kongō, so symmetrical that he looked normal when viewed in isolation; it was only when Shin stood with other people that his hard-earned perfection hit home. He sat on the bench before his locker, back straight, hands resting lightly on his knees, biceps and triceps and the flexor muscles of his forearms rippling even in repose, as magnificent and unapproachable in his solitude as a high-mountain tsumenoshiro, a war castle, protecting the Hachioji pass.

As he had made a habit through his entire career, his big hands were covered by the white-crossed game-gloves of the White Knights of Ojo – he had a box shipped from his former school at the beginning of every season, and each pair of gloves bore a short note and a signature from a different active Ojo football player. He would wear one pair on game day, and then ship the gloves back to the care of the player who had signed them. To these student-athletes, Shin was their ultimate warrior monk, with the football field his demesne.

If there was one obvious change to Shin from his school days, it was his head: he wore a buzz cut. A recent affectation, he took the shears to himself on a daily basis. Some teammates likened this to a monk-like discipline and commitment. Some believed he did it to intimidate his opponents in some way. Sena knew the truth, confided to him by a dry-eyed Shin over dinner during the lull-period between the end of the divisional championship games and the League championship: in an emotionless tone, Shin revealed that he'd been living with cancer for the last half-year. Shin eschewed the excuse that the radiation and chemical therapy regimen was the cause of his deterioration in play – but the draining process had to have a role in his lack of productivity during his final months with the San Antonio club. If he did not shave his head, then his hair-loss would be an obvious clue to his team mates and the public (and opponents) that he was suffering from a serious malady. As deeply private and honest as Shin was, introducing a shaved head was the most efficient solution; to the players on the Ojo teams in Japan, it was a confirmation that he was a football pilgrim, searching for enlightenment in the West.

When Shin had become available as a free agent, Sena had ignored his usual humble and self-effacing inclinations and had approached both the owner and the general manager of the Sabers. _We need Seijuro Shin, _he had stated flatly. _Last year, our Special Teams were a notch below where they were the previous year_. _Shin may not be able to play at safety for an entire game, but he would be an amazing boon in the nickel coverage packages, and his worth as a special teams blocker could be incalculable._ At the time, Sena had no clue about Shin's physical ailments. The ability to add Sin to the team was part hunch, part homage to the player that he respected most.

Shin made Sena look like a genius. With the limited role keeping him fresh and uninjured, Shin played like the clock had turned back to his best years. The special teams play, itself, was significant enough to rank the Sabers number one in the league on kick-off returns for touchdowns – the beneficiary of this great play was Sena himself. It was he who occupied the position of kick-returner for the Sabers, and it was Sena who tucked in behind Shin's hip as their scissoring legs ate up the white-lined real estate; it was Sena who saw the hunch of Shin's big shoulders as the enemy drew close, saw the amazing acceleration as the former linebacker exploded into hapless opponents, to plant them violently into the turf. Game after game, time after time, the same script would play out and Sena would find himself free for long gains and, often, touchdowns.

Touchdowns: crossing the goal line, enveloped by a solid wave of crowd noise and a constellation of photo-flashes and video-camera lights; glancing back over his shoulder, over the celebrating helmets of the other members of the Saber return team as they rushed to congratulate him; witnessing the dejected walk of the other coverage team as they moved to their sideline; watching Shin rise slowly, painfully, from the results of his collision far back in the middle of the field; seeing Shin raise a cross-covered hand and point to him, a small and personal acknowledgement that meant more to Sena Kobayakawa than any accolade the team or the league could bestow upon him.

Sena would make today a special day for the guy next to him.


	4. Chapter 4

**In the tunnel**

The tunnel leading to the field was a tight fit, with the entire 55- man team squeezed into the small area. A coordinator from the event staff stood at the edge of the tunnel, ready to direct the Sabers en masse into the inflatable corridor, then through the huge air-filled Boston Saber helmet and onto the field.

The five captains were standing together at the front of the team. Sena took off his hat and flipped his sweaty hair out of his eyes, surveying his fellow leaders and the hungry eyes of the team. He turned to the man next to him and nodded – the massive black man, larger even than Rikiya Gao at 6'7'' and well over 300 lbs., bellowed in a thunderbolt voice: "BRING IT IN, SABERS!"

In seconds, 55 men clustered as closely as it was possible to do, pressing into a huge huddle centered over the 5 captains. The heat was unbearable, and sweat and snot dripped like rain as the intense group hovered together; the most striking thing was the silence… every man tried to control their breathing, tried to not make a sound.

"We busted ass to get here," said Sena, speaking in a relatively normal tone of voice. This type of pre-game ritual had, over time, become second nature to him – thankfully, his command of English had been honed by use and study over the course of his career. "We have one more game to win… for the championship." Sena looked around, his gaze lingering at Shin, who was staring at his gloved hands. "That trophy is OURS." His voice rose at the end, and the team answered with growls of assent.

"Are we going to beat them?" He asked, softly. If possible, the team became even more silent and contracted more closely around him.

Sena bowed his head, his voice rising. "We're **not** going to beat them…" His head came up, and a fire filled his eyes. His goatee seemed to bristle around the hard line of his jaw. "… we're not JUST going to beat them, are we?" A sound began in the throats around him, deeper than a growl, and it seemed to carry up his words as he spoke them. "Kami-sama help them, they're coming onto the field to face the Boston Sabers." Sena's gloved hands clenched into fists. "They're coming to face US. We're not going to BEAT them…" Sena paused. He turned completely around in place, seeming to take in every member of the team, nodding his head with deep, dramatic sincerity. "What are we going to do?"

"We're going to KILL them!" A raw and powerful shout from every man.

Sena frowned and raised an eyebrow. "What? Is that it? That won't do for the Sabers." He raised his arms into the air, fists still tight. "WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO?"

"**WE'RE GOING TO KILL THEM**!"

Sena's lips curled into a hard, predatory smile. _Thank you, Hiruma_. "Yaaaa – HAAA! We are going to KILL them! LET'S GET IT DONE!"

The players ricocheted off one another in a frenzy of jumping and chest-bumping, their excitement and ritual so unnerving that the coordinator at the edge of the tunnel waved them through seconds early – the team had decided to be introduced together as a unit, as opposed to having certain players introduced individually. Sena and Shin looked at each other from opposite sides of the tunnel, buffeted as the other players sprinted past, led by the four other captains. Sena reached up and settled his helmet on his head, eyes suddenly hidden by the polarized curve of plastic above his face mask. He stepped forward and held out his fist, and Seijuro Shin bumped it with his own. "For the glory of the kingdom!" they said in unison, and Shin's mouth curved upward slightly beneath the ridges of plastic that protected it. They turned and began to jog out of the tunnel.

"Put our faith," Shin added, quietly, "in what is in front of us."

The group organizing the introduction ceremony had planned on using a fog machine to create a cloud-effect around the inflatable helmet; because the coordinator had mistimed the entrance, the majority of the Sabers were already running past before the machine could kick in. As Shin and Sena strode out, however, seconds behind the rest of the team, the mist had finally managed to cover the face of the giant helmet. Their bodies were wrapped about with thinning tendrils of cloaking fog – the effect was magical and fearsome, captured on the titanic screens on either end of the stadium and broadcast around the world: Sena and Shin looking like two grim medieval warriors in armor, emerging from their stronghold and spoiling for a fight.


	5. Chapter 5

**Interlude**

Mamori Anezaki leaned forward in the plush leather of her club seat, rising slightly and stretching out over the row of seats before her so that she could more easily peer through the huge glass wall at the front of the luxury suite. One hand adjusted her grey-tinted sunglasses, while the other pressed her iPhone to her ear. "He's not… ah, there he is. He and Shin just ran out of that big helmet together." She whistled softly under her breath. "Cool effect…" One manicured figure tapped the side of the phone. "I think I'm coming up with a marketing angle on that." Loud, somewhat maniacal laughter sounded from the speaker of the phone. "Shut up." She said, not unkindly. "I know you can see it where you are. You'd be HERE with me," her voice rose with emphasis, "if you didn't cause… if Homeland Security hadn't…" She blew her breath upward in frustration, pushing strands of her long blond hair away from her face. "Hiruma! Don't give me that, it was a _huge_ explosion." She rolled her eyes, mouth turning down slightly as she listened to the voice on the phone. "He's your friend and YOUR CLIENT! Right, right… _our_ client." Mamori sat back in her seat, crossing her legs. "You should be here, Yoichi. It's the championship."

"What? Where's To-san? What's going on now?" A small, slim figure darted up and twisted through the seats to the front of the room, pressing his hands and face against the plate glass, his quick breaths fogging the area around his spike-haired head. "Daddy!" he yelled in English.

"Raimon!" Suzuna Kobayakawa called to her son from where she sat in a couch near the food table, desperately trying to place a bottle of formula into the mouth of a fussy baby girl. "You're right in front of Oba-chan!" The little girl continued to resist, a line of formula tracing a diagonal, dripping smile from cheek to cheek above her actual, pouting lips.

"Oh!" Mamori exclaimed. She turned in her seat and smiled at Suzuna. "I don't know how he knows, but Hiruma just told me that Shin's wife arrived at the stadium."

"How does elf-bro know that from Tokyo?" Suzuna asked. She raised an eyebrow and shook her head. "No, no… never mind." She turned her baby in her hands and gave the little one a loud, quick and unexpected kiss on the cheek. The baby, taken aback by the sudden assault, stopped struggling and began to gurgle. "Well," Suzuna muttered, "at least Natsuhiko didn't screw up picking her up from the airport."

"We sent him in a limo… with a driver…"

"He IS my brother… remember? He managed to get both himself and Sena on the wrong train, on _gameday_, both of them stranded in Nagano-ken…"

"I want to SEE, where's my daddy?" whined six-year-old Raimon Kobayakawa. "Where is number 21, Oba-chan?"

Mamori leaned forward again. "Well, they're taking their time introducing the other team… dear, I think I see him right… there!" Her index finger darted out, only to whack into the glass in front of her. "Yeoowwy-owwy!" The little boy in front of her started to laugh at her odd cry. The voice on the phone, after a moment of silence, chortled loudly.

Mamori disconnected.

Still smiling, Raimon turned back to the window, his eyes wide as they took in the huge sweep of the upper tiers of the building, the banners flapping heavily in the water-logged atmosphere, the artificial light refracted by the falling rain into a shimmer of rainbows – he had seen his father play a large number of times in his short life, but never a spectacle as massive as this. "Do you think Monta Oji-san is watching right now? I wish he was here…"

Suzuna stood, a still-slim vision in designer skirt and Lucchese stiletto boots, burbling child wriggling in her arms. Although Sena's wife had stopped living in skating apparel and inline skates in the time before her first pregnancy, Mamori still had difficulty in reconciling the fashionable, confident, intelligent mother picking at the buffet table with the flat-chested, screaming cheerleader she had been during the Deimon years. _Then again_, Mamori thought, examining her own Dior leather pants and Gucci sandals, _sometimes I don't recognize myself…_

"Uncle Monta," Suzuna said, turning away from the shrimp plate," would love to be here, Raimon. But he has a duty to the team that he is coaching. They're in the championship game in the Tokyo Dome this year, the Rice Bowl…" She bent forward, a twinkle in her eye. "If Daddy's team wasn't playing in this game, we'd be there cheering him on. And, eating that yakitori that all you men love, that place with the huge cow head hanging over the front door…"

Raimon puffed his chest out, happy to be referenced as a "man" by his mother. He stepped back and eyed his reflection in the window, looking for signs he had matured. "Almost time for the stand-up song," He observed.

"'Star-Spangled Banner.'" His mother and Mamori corrected him simultaneously. He stuck out his tongue.

A knock came at the door to the suite. A tall man opened the door from the corridor outside, holding it so that a pregnant woman could enter before him. He closed the door, and flashed a winning smile over his shoulder at Suzuna. "Not a problem, I guaranteed you 100% success in picking up the beautiful Kaede Shin."

Suzuna grinned and rolled her eyes, then bowed some-what mockingly to her brother, Natsuhiko Taki. "Fine job, aniki…" She handed the baby to him, and patted him on the bald pate as she walked by. "… thanks for not interfering with the limo driver. Here, why don't you hold Ayame for a bit." She walked over to the woman and bowed. "Kaede Shin, you honor us by being here today. Please, let us act as old friends do… certainly, we can share stories about our husbands." Suzuna giggled mischievously and gestured to the couches and plush chairs. "Would you like to sit down, and perhaps join me in some water or decaffeinated tea?"

Kaede Shin smiled sweetly and performed an answering bow. She was tall and angular, even now in the late stages of pregnancy, and dark circles of exhaustion marred the perfection of her face. A former Olympic triathlete, Kaede had met Shin when he was at University, when he had decided on a whim to attempt an Ironman Triathlon – a triathlon in which he placed fifth overall. "It is I who am honored, Suzuna-san…"

"Please, just Suzuna… no honorifics between us."

Kaede blushed, and then carefully seated herself on a nearby couch. "I am indebted to you for contacting me and proposing this surprise for Seijuro…."

A sudden yelp startled everyone, and all eyes in the room turned to Taki. His face was frozen in a wince, with both the pudgy hands of his niece buried in the hairs of his van dyke beard and pulling. "Sorry," he said from between gritted teeth, "that's my bad."

"There is no one who has more perseverance of spirit than my husband, no one who is as strong mentally as Seijuro…" She looked at her hands, folded on her lap. "But, he has become more grim than serious as his… situation… has worsened." Kaede looked up at Suzuna, moisture evident in the corners of her clear eyes. "I'm not sure what Sena-san has planned today, but he has always been a good friend and my husband's most admired opponent. I trust that Eyeshield 21, captain of the Boston Sabers, Sena-san, will help to make this a game to remember. I believe that…" Kaede seemed oblivious to the small tear scoring down her face. "… I believe that, if this will be my husband's last game…" she seemed unable to go on.

Mamori, texting Hiruma and demanding that he pull strings so that all costs associated with Kaede Shin's visit to the United States would be comped by their agency, paused and looked up. "Your trust is absolutely well founded, Kaede-chan." She smiled, trying to broadcast all the confidence she had in her friend Sena.

Suzuna also smiled. It was she who Sena confided to, as they shared the stories of the day and discussed the hopes and fears of the future, lying in bed together before sleep with the static-popping accompaniment of the baby monitor. Sena had laid out his plan for this day, brief and eminently do-able – Suzuna knew how much of his good heart was in the actions that would unfold in a few short minutes. "My husband, Kaede, can be very serious about some things. I have never seen him more serious than about this day." Suzuna stopped and turned her head to look at Raimon at the window. Her eyes moved back to Kaede. "Remember, Sena knows that the world is watching. I think…" she reached out a hand and covered Kaede's meshed fingers, "I know that when this day is over, you will be very happy."

The two ladies smiled at each other, until the mood was broken by the coughing sound of coming from Ayame. Taki squinted down, jaw tight, considering the spots of white vomit splattering his Armani suit-coat. "It's impossible…" he sputtered.

Ayame gurgled happily and began to chew on her fingers.


	6. Chapter 6

**Make this happen**

Sena did not love America. Not like a native born, and not as someone caught up in the internal politics of the country or the place of the United States on the world stage. However, as the color guard presented the flags at mid-field and as the first chords of the "Star Spangled Banner," began to sound across the stadium, he removed his helmet and stood as straight and respectful as any of his other American-born teammates. He did not love America, but he loved things about America: the United States had given the world American football, and thus had made the path of his life possible, including his friendships and his precious family; he had been able to travel the length and breadth of the country, and found the people to be energetic, open, gracious, and very accepting of a stranger in their midst – perhaps more so than in Nihon; he loved the diversity of the country, first experienced during the Devilbat team "death march" to Las Vegas, where you never knew what you might see or experience down the highway or in the next city – especially when it came to food.

The song was being performed by a child's choir. He let their spiraling voices carry his thoughts away for a moment, and wondered what Suzuna and Raimon and little Ayame were doing, if they were watching his tiny figure from their perch in the luxury suite. He hoped that Kaede Shin had arrived safely, and that she was comfortable with her delicate cargo. This led his musing back to Shin, who stood stone-faced further down the sideline with the group of defensive backs, never the music enthusiast, tolerating the patriotic interlude before the game commenced and subtly flexing his body with isometrics.

The crowd began to roar before the song concluded, blotting out the last ringing notes of the anthem – such a thing would never have been permitted in Japan: only in the States would you witness a situation where the measure of the success of a certain musical performance was the volume of the cheers drowning out that self-same performance. In this case, the audience was extremely pleased; the decibels grew even higher as a flight of jet fighters roared past just above the stadium, rattling Sena's teeth in their sockets. The noise around the stadium was apocalyptic, and his ears popped from the overpressure.

Sena walked slowly down the sidelines, working his jaw to get his ears back to normal. He had a ready smile and encouraging word for his team mates as he passed, hand-shaking, fist and chest bumping, marveling again at the sheer intensity on display as every player began the complex and personal process of ramping themselves into adrenaline overdrive – this was the space a player had to live in within his head so that he could justify the level of raw physical punishment that playing American football wrought. He stopped next to the tall form of the Saber Offensive Coordinator, the man who designed and selected the plays executed by the offense. A former quarterback, the O.C was a long-muscled Texan who might have seemed more at home on a basketball court, towering over Sena at a lean 6'6". The man tried to maintain an air of cool nonchalance at the craziness surrounding him, but the rapid movement of his jaws around a thick wad of chewing gum indicated his emotional state. He looked up from the clipboard he was studying as Sena sidled up, and one dark eyebrow rose up beneath the bill of his visor. He opened his mouth to talk, frowned, and then launched a mass of spittle onto the already soaked grass beneath his sneakers.

"Y'all know what's real funny?" He jerked his chin at Sena in acknowledgement, and grinned. "M'wife made me promise not to chew tonight, 'cause this game's gonna be broadcast all over the world. Who knows, there could be a head coach job out there waitin' for me." The "chew" was not referring to the gum in his mouth, but tobacco; Sena knew this, having watched the man spit brown for nearly the entire season. The man's mouth crooked up in a strange half-grin as he watched Sena, and then he shook his head. "You're gonna do it, ain't you?"

Sena's face was looking onto the field, but his eyes shifted right towards the man. "Hai."

The O.C. rubbed his curly hair above the visor, sighing loudly. "Well, hell…" His eyes narrowed. "Did you tell him?"

Sena's eyes swung back out to the field. "No." He shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

"Oh, for Christ's sake… does the return team know, at least?"

"Yes, they know."

"You got _that_ right, I reckon." The man frowned again and spit a large glob from his lips in a parabolic arc, raising his eyebrows in appreciation at the distance it travelled. "Hmmm. Well, when you gonna fill him in? Ain't it kind of late in the game, pun intended?"

Sena took a deep breath, turned his head and gave an obviously uncomfortable smile. "I guess I'll tell him now." He started to walk away, then turned back and gave a small bow with his head. "Thanks, Tex. You honor us both."

The O.C. blinked, then returned a manufactured scowl, jaw moving furiously around his gum. "Don't be thankin' me, there, 21. I'm givin' you just enough rope for you to hang, here… if Coach asks me what the hell y'all are doin', I'm going to tell him it's some of that 'bushido' crap that I know nothin' about, and I'm going to get out the man's way when he goes to kill you." He leaned forward, very serious, and stared at Sena intently. "And, if Shin screws up some way and they get the ball or, God help you, six points…?" His hand made a gun, and he mimed shooting it. "If they score, I'll kill you myself." He tilted his head to the side. "This team has worked too hard for a dog's breakfast at the start. You better make this happen."

Sena swallowed. "There won't be a screw up." He grinned over his shoulder, suddenly. "Hey, your wife was right." He pointed with his thumb. "Here comes a camera crew."

The O.C. forced his face into a smile and whipped around, coughing… to see no cameras or sideline reporters anywhere nearby. He rolled his eyes and reached into the pocket of his pants. "Damn it, Sena! I swallowed my damn gum…!"


	7. Chapter 7

**Lessons to be learned**

There were a few minutes left until the captains met at midfield for the coin-flip, the lengthy pause in the start of the game created to accommodate the world-wide television coverage and allow the networks to shill on behalf of their sponsors. Sena approached Shin where he sat on the bench, discussing strategy with the Defensive Backs coach, the Linebackers coach and a majority of the younger defensive players.

"Shin," the D.B. coach was requesting, "one more time, just like in the film session on Friday…"

"This quarterback," Shin responded, eyes scanning the faces in front of him, "just as you saw on film, can throw the ball the length of the field on a line. But," Shin raised his eyebrows, eyes level and lit with a predatory gleam, "this strength of arm handicaps him on short outs, drags and curl patterns. He has little touch on these throws, firing the ball like a bullet when it should land softly, as a dragonfly. This indicates a flaw we can exploit: he is too excitable during the first few sets of downs."

The D.B. coach nodded, crouching down near Shin. "Exactly. We've all seen the trending on film… they test short early before taking their shots at mid- and long range." He held up a fist. "But, all this depends on stopping the run… they're not great at it, but they'll keep after it. It's simple: we control the line, they give up and start with the short passes, and then it's your turn."

Shin dropped one gloved fist into the open palm of the other hand. "Stay close to your targets. The quarterback is canny, but do not be fooled by his eye movements. I can tell you from experience, he will _always_ look off his primary receiver, so do not leave your man." Shin put both hands out in a pushing motion. "Make good contact off the line of scrimmage, do not get impacted…"

"Knocked…" intoned the L.B. coach in his deep bass. "Don't let them drive you…"

Shin smiled in thanks. "…_knocked_ from blanketing the short patterns. And," he raised a finger, "they often wait to release the running back – do not flow to another man's coverage area, wait for the back to emerge and then mark him as a target." He made an overhand slapping motion. "Slap and rip. Time it correctly. When the ball goes short, slap down, rip out, no penalties." Shin leaned forward, jaw muscles tight. "Make them regret they every thought about opposing our will."

The D.B. coach leaned back in his crouch, and turned to the players. "You got it? The man's been there and done that, he's right on. Remember your assignments, don't hit early but hit real hard."

"REAL real hard." Added the L.B. coach, with a nasty laugh. Both coaches began to clap. "That's it, let's kick ass!" The group dispersed.

"Shin."

Shin turned his head. The rain collected on the bristly hairs of his shaved scalp, and ran in streams down his sharp, strong features. "Sena."

Sena stopped a few steps away from Shin, mind still in turmoil, knowing he should have explained himself before now. After a lengthening pause, Shin raised an eyebrow at him, and lifted his hands up and out, palms up, in a shrug-like prompt for him to continue speaking.

"Captains! We need captains to the front! Coin-flip!" A loud voice interrupted the tableau as an assistant coach jogged by. "Number 21! Front and center!"

Sena tightened his lips, stood formally and bowed deeply to Shin, who recoiled slightly in surprise. "I owe you an apology, Seijuro Shin-san – my team-mate. My friend." Sena spoke quickly and forcefully in Japanese, still frozen in his bow. "I have presumed much, and by my actions I might be guilty of causing offense to you and your family. Please know, I hold you in the utmost respect."

"What?" Shin stood. "What do you mean, my family, Kobayakawa-san."

"CAPTAINS!"

Sena rose from his bow, facing Shin squarely. "You have not said as much, Shin-san, but this is your final game of football. Win or lose, you will return to Japan and go through treatment to conquer cancer. Your body, even _your_ body, will be affected… you know as well as I how difficult it would be to return: with a family at home yet travelling across the world to the States; a year older after treatment that might take months and still not in playing shape; committing every last fraction of energy to this game of constant collisions…" Sena nodded slowly. "I _know_, Seijuro."

Shin was silent, head tilted down slightly so that his eyes were hidden in shadow, rain-water flowing down the hard planes of his face like tears. Now, it was his turn to pause before speaking.

"Could _some_body find the damned captains and get their asses over here!" The assistant coach was wailing, now.

"What do you mean, my family, Sena." Shin repeated, softly.

"I have brought your wife here to watch you. Kaede-san is in my luxury box, with my family."

Shin's eyes opened wide, and he twisted in place, attempting to spy through the rain and mist and blinding light, as if he could spot his wife through all of it purely because he willed it. Slightly crazed, his eyes pivoted back on Sena. "That was not a choice that was yours to make!"

Sena bowed again, quickly. "And yet, she and I made it. For you. So that, when you score a touchdown today, the eyes of your wife will be on you. The ears of your unborn child will hear the vibrations as the crowd calls your name." Sena stepped closer, almost nose to nose with Shin. "So that your memory of your last game will be triumphant, and bring a smile to your face whenever you speak of it… whatever might happen in the future." Sena's eyes were commanding, not to be denied. "You will score a touchdown today, Shin, if I have to pick you up and carry you into the end-zone on my back. I _will_."

Shin stared, head tilting back and eyes squinted slightly, as if measuring this new, ferocious personality in the man he knew. His thin lips straightened from their frown. "Why." He asked, finally. "Why such lengths, for me?"

Sena shrugged. "That is an easy answer: because you are the best of us. Leading from the front, never relaxing, always the hard way – your example was what drove all of us to be the best that we could be. When you score a touchdown, it is me, and Sakuraba and Takami that run beside you. It's Monta, and Kid, and Riku that have their hands on the ball with you when you cross the goal – the entire generation that has wanted this football dream." Sena stepped back, eyes determined, and poked forward an index finger. "When you retire, it marks the end of our era."

Shin's mouth grimaced. He stepped forward and reached up a hand, paused with the white-crossed glove before his eyes, and then put the hand on Sena's shoulder pad. "Not true. _You_ will still be here, Sena. As the example, as banner-carrier…"

Sena cocked his head to the side, shook it in a negating gesture and interrupted him. "Today is not about me, Shin. It's about you. You will take the ball to start the game, and you will…ERP?!"

"_There_ you are, you little sonfagun!" One of the other captains, the cyclopean offensive lineman who had called the team to order in the tunnel, appeared behind Sena and effortlessly picked him up off the ground in a backwards bear-hug. "Coach has been calling for captains, Sena… where you been, man?" The giant turned, still with Sena locked in his arms, and lumbered off.

Shin stood, helmet dangling forgotten in one hand, nostrils flaring as he forced deep breaths to calm himself. After a moment he, again, turned his face upwards to the sky.


	8. Chapter 8

**Interlude II**

Kaede Shin stood near the window, arm extended and hand pressing against the cold wall of glass. "He knows." She said, her voice quiet and frightened and happy simultaneously. Her free hand rested upon the curve of her belly. "To-san knows you are here, little one. Let me tell you what he looks like, so you will remember – he is tall and strong and handsome, and he is dressed all in armor like a samurai of olden times. Soon, he will don his helmet and go to war, and he will triumph because he will accept nothing less – as it should be…"

"Okaa-san, did you ever talk to me like Kaede-san does to the baby in her belly?"

"All the time, Raimon. Your sister, as well…"

"Did you smile like that when you did?"

"Oh, yes… except when you wiggled in my tummy and stepped on my liver." Suzuna emphasized her mother's right to payback by tickling her son unmercifully.

"Coinflip!" Taki said from where he sat, dabbing soda water on the lapels of his suit-coat. Raimon struggled his way out of Suzuna's arms and moved next to his uncle.

Forehead tight against the window, Raimon provided a staccato play-by-play. "There it goes – heads, they called heads – and…it's… what _is_ it…what did they say, what did they say?"

Taki smiled winningly. "Heads! Obviously, as I knew it would be."

Raimon threw his hands up in the touchdown sign and beamed to his mother. "Yes! Sabers get the ball! To-san's going to kick butt!"

"Raimon!" Suzuna made an apologetic smile to Shin's wife, shocked at her son's language. She looked daggers at him. "What do you say, Raimon Kobayakawa?"

Misunderstanding, Raimon turned his head to Kaede. "I'm sorry, Kaede-san… Shin-san is going to kick butt, too."

Kaede looked at Raimon, then at Suzuna, and back at the innocent expression of the boy. A slow smile spread across her face and she began to giggle. Suzuna began to laugh as well. Raimon, delighted that people were happy, although he did not know the reason, joined in.

Mamori stepped out from the bathroom, iPhone in hand. "Did I miss something?"

"Kick _butt_!"

"Raimon! Enough!"


	9. Chapter 9

**Reporting from near the Saber bench**

The Boston Saber captains shook hands with their counterparts, wished them good luck, and walked back to their respective sidelines. Sena's head was spinning, still, from the emotional discussion with Shin. _Is he offended? He's so hard to read, sometimes… _

The rain was lightening, less a falling curtain of weighty drops and now more a cloud of moisture, like a diffused fog bank that had somehow encompassed the stadium. As he approached the sideline, he tested the field with his cleats: drainage was good, and the turf was holding up nicely. The worst thing that could have happened to his plan would be a muddy, foot-sucking surface.

The entire team had risen to their feet and formed a human corridor to either side of the captains' path, congratulating their leaders for winning the coin-toss, and thus the "blessing of lady-luck." _Got to get the return team together… Shin, where's Shin?_

"Sena! SENA-SAN!"

Sena's head jerked around, recognizing the voice, if not understanding it's presence near his bench. "Patrick-san?"

Looking fashionable, if out-of-place, in a formal shirt-tie-blazer combination and John Lobb two-tone loafers, was Patrick Spencer – Spencer was the starting running back for the league franchise in Los Angeles, the L.A. Blitz. Football fans around the world, of course, knew the man as Panther, the Most Valuable Player in the league during the previous year. The expensive clothing was a joy to behold, even down to the gold tie-clip with the league logo on it.

"What are you doing here?" Sena asked with a wide smile, removing his helmet and grabbing Panther's hand. Spencer smiled just as wide, enfolding Sena in a quick man-hug. Something bumped into his pads as they disengaged, and Sena realized that Spencer had a wireless mike in his hand. He jerked his chin at the microphone, and raised an eyebrow. "What is that? Are you a reporter now? I didn't see anything about a retirement."

Panther laughed and straightened his tie. "Retirement? No way. Man, it's true, it's true…after we got smoked in the divisional round of the play-offs, the World Sports Network offered me a part time gig." He elbowed Sena in the chest. "Dude, it's great money, _plus_ I get to be here for the game!" He snapped two strong fingers together. "Hey, you know what? You remember Watt, right, from NASA school days, our wide-out?" Sena did remember Jeremy Watt, the former wide receiver of the high-school NASA Shuttles/Aliens football team; Watt had been Japanophile before setting foot on Nihon, and his otaku-status had only grown over the course of the decades. He had made a name for himself, following the end of his football career, as a network play-by-play announcer. "The network is going to put all of Watt's Japan-love to work – he is doing the simulcast of the game for the Japan feed."

"Ah, so everyone back home will see and hear him. That should come as a shock to all the old Devilbats…"

Panther smiled slightly, and his hand reached up to rub the back of his clean-shaven head. "I got a favor to ask, man. For old time's sake, Sena, can you give me something?"

"Eh?"

Spencer straightened and indicated the microphone with his eyes. "We don't have to go on camera – give me a little nugget, something I can add into my commentary on the broadcast that'll make me look good." Panther flashed a toothy smile. "Come on, Eyeshield – help a brother out. I snuck back here, but your Coach is going to get security to haul me back to the booth… make it worth my while!" He held up a hand, as if swearing an oath. "I promise, I won't name you as a source."

Sena looked around him at the activity around the bench. "Panther – I mean, Patrick…"

"Either, Sena."

"…I have to go get the return team ready to go. It's not the right…" Sena stopped, then turned to face Panther fully. "There is one thing… watch Shin today."

"Shin? What's going on with Shin?"

Sena forced a tight smile. "You wanted some insider information, here it is, Patrick… tonight is _Shin's_ night."

Panther stared at Sena's face, and then grinned. "All right. I know just how I'll use that: 'sources near the Saber bench…'" Panther took a second and looked at his feet, and then around him. "We are _near_ the bench, right?" He gave a full smile. "'…sources near the Saber's bench have stated that…that... today's game plan calls for ahhh… a bigger contribution, from the veteran presence on the team.'" He smiled again. "Not bad, huh? Not sure where I heard that before…"

Sena grinned. "Not bad." He spotted the return team, Seijuro Shin among them, gathered near the round figure of the Special Teams coach. He reached out a hand and grabbed Panther's fist. "When this is over, we'll get together – me, you, Shin, Suzuna, your wife Stephanie-san and Shin's wife Kaede…"

Spencer frowned. "Shin's wife is here in the States? Isn't she about 7 months pregnant?"

Sena nodded gravely. "She decided to fly here, despite that." He began to jog away. "Look, we'll talk later, okay?"

"Okay. Good luck, Sena! Tell Shin I said good luck to him, too!" Panther watched Sena for a bit, and then turned away to trudge back to the press box. "'Sources near the Saber bench…" He began to laugh to himself and did a quick dance step as he moved. "Man, I got me a second career, I think…"


	10. Chapter 10

**Magician**

"Glad you could join us, 21."

The Special Team coach was grinning behind his bushy mustache. The coach was only slightly taller than Sena, with a huge chest and a belly to match. His hairy forearms were as big as Shin's thighs. He had made a name for himself twenty years before as a fullback, an oversized running back utilized in two-back offenses to strike a blow at the place of attack, allowing the ball carrier to move past his block and gain more yardage. The coach pushed his baseball cap back on his head, revealing his creased forehead and the bald curve of his scalp. "Bring it in, boys!" He bawled. The return team gathered around him, and he slowly creaked down to one knee.

Sena reviewed the faces of the 10 players around him – Coach designated a mix of veterans and younger players to participate in this important phase of the game so it was a curious mingling of experienced, steady stares and shifting, wide-eyed glances that looked back. The players seemed to be connected to the same electric socket, overcharged robots with limbs in continual motion, twitching their necks forward to listen. Even Shin was shifting, his movements structured like junbi undo, classic Judo warm-ups. Shin looked back at him expressionlessly, eyes closed to emotion. The mist continued to fill the air, and as the coach pulled out his sketchboard, the white surface became dewed with condensation.

"Okay. This is it. Let's talk about it…" The older man spoke in brisk phrases as he began to draw. The sketchboard consisted of a rectangle, representing the full field with yard markers. Quickly, the man used a black dry-erase marker to scrawl a line of triangles at the top of the board. "Here they are, those freakin' degenerates," he smiled, as his son-in-law was a player on the other team. "This is their usual kickoff set. Very vanilla." He raised a stubby finger, already marked black with ink. "But, their gunners are the best in the game." He drew dotted lines to represent the progress of the gunners, the men at either end of the field for the other team, nearest to the sidelines, who were able to go in motion and go beyond the ball before it was kicked. "Both guys are track guys, and they rip it up. Sooo…" He coughed and began to sketch in Xs at the bottom of the board, representing the Sabers. "So, we're gonna go with the double wedge and take it right up the gut… the gunners speed will be negated by concentrated blocking."

As soon as the coach said "double wedge," the schematics of the formation coalesced in Sena's mind. Once the ball was in the air, the five largest Sabers, the offensive linemen and linebackers on loan for the return team, would take up position as a group at the thirty yard line, right between the hash marks denoting the "center lane" of the field. At the same time, a smaller group of four men, tight ends and fullbacks, would position and center themselves at the ten yard line, twenty yards behind the others. The two men designated as kick returners would be back near the goal line, awaiting the ball: once one of them caught the ball, the other would act as another blocker, and both would run straight up the middle of the field. The whole plan would be like a moving battering ram, with the first wedge smashing and disrupting the initial attack of the kicking team, the second wedge creating a capsule or pocket around that initial point of contact, so as to force the opposition outside the line of attack. The most important role would be for the final guardian, the blocker immediately ahead of the ball carrier – he would need to create the "spring" block, a one-on-one duel with the desperate foe to create that crease in the coverage, that one hole, to allow the ball carrier to spring free.

Shin was extraordinary in the role of the lead blocker. However, at Sena's insistence, Shin would be carrying the ball on this play.

Sena would be lead blocker, today.

"Any questions, boys? We havin' fun yet?" The Special Teams coach looked at the faces around him and grinned like a deranged walrus. "Give a man a hand, won't you?" He held out his beefy hand, and one of the younger players grasped it and hauled him up. He hit the player on the rear with the sketchboard as thanks.

The return team, as a group, looked at Sena. He swallowed, and forced a smile. "This is it. We have the plan, now. And," He glanced at Shin, "and we know how we're going to execute it." After a moment, Shin nodded. His eyes gleamed with sudden determination.

The coach gave Sena a look, and winked. "Go open a can, son." He turned to the group. "You're a great bunch of hombres, boys. Don't forget that you're Boston Sabers. Let's start this thing right!" The players shouted loudly in agreement, and Sena vented his anxiety by howling loudest of all.

The players began to move to the mid-field marker. "Hey!" the Special Teams coach called after them in a voice that carried easily over the crowd. "**Do** **not** **forget your mouthpieces!**"

One player, sheepishly, turned and jogged back to the coach – it was the same man who had helped the coach get to his feet. The older man whacked the player soundly on the helmet, picked up something from the sodden grass and handed it to him: a forgotten U-shaped piece of black plastic. "You want to look like me, cherry?" He gruffed, one eyebrow rising almost to the bill of his cap.

The player shook his head vigorously, then turned and loped as fast as his dignity might allow back to his mates.

"Heyyyyyy, Cherry!"

"Shinjin baka, Cherry!"

"Is that a tic-tac, or is that your tooth, Cherry?"

"Almost a Darwin award, there, Cherry!"

Sena smiled and Shin grinned slightly as the unfortunate player was now christened with a familiar nickname. As was tradition, he would be called Cherry until the next individual demonstration of prime dumbassery occurred – unfortunately, as the game was the last of the season, the man would most likely be called Cherry until next training camp… several months at the least. What was key about the incident, however, was how it defused the tension: like a grounding wire diffused a charge, the comedic awkwardness altered the emotional paradigm of the return team. As a group, they were reset to what Sena had recognized in the locker room: confident and eager to do their job.

Sena looked over his shoulder and his eyes widened – the coach was beaming back at him. The man had a different mouthpiece between each thick hairy finger, all of which he made disappear with a flourish.

Did the player _really_ drop the mouthpiece, or…?

Sena grinned tightly and turned his attention to the task at hand. A special team coach, indeed.


	11. Chapter 11

**Audible**

Sena pushed his helmet up, so that it rode high on his forehead. One minute to game time.

Fireworks shot into the moist air, adding their sinking smoke to the overall misty atmosphere across the football field. The covey of soggy dancers bolted towards the sideline, the game officials trotted out to midfield for one final check, one rapid survey before allowing the players to take their positions. Ghostly rainbows continued to prism before his eyes as the stadium lights shone down. Again and again, his feet scuffed against the turf, each time the action assuring his brain that traction was still okay. The crowd noise was a storm surge, battering his ears in a continuous wave, with individual noises indistinguishable from the whole. Despite his best efforts, despite his outwardly confident demeanor, his mind revved like an engine injected with nitrous oxide – the white heat of his focus on the game plan, with little thought fragments flying through the combustion chamber of his skull like sparks:

How would he perform? Would his ambitious plan, the one he and Suzuna had built so carefully, collapse because he just couldn't do the job, like Shin did time after time after time? Could he use his body to create the seam in coverage?

Was Shin up to the task? His will was not in question, but could his damaged body maneuver and accelerate and balance the way it did when he was in his prime?

The rest of the return team, would they stick their blocks? American football was a quintessential team game – all the personal skill in the world mattered nothing if any of the other nine men faltered in some way, allowing a torrent of tacklers to explode onto the ball carrier.

Even now, test after test, was the field _really_ adequate for a shot at a touchdown return? Traction, slickness, drainage… would the grass hold up during the first play of the game, and allow his plan to unfold?

And what about…

"21. A word, please." A flat, business-like tone came from directly behind him.

"Coach!" Sena pivoted in place, his helmet tipping slightly. He quickly reached up to remove it from his head. While Sena was facing his doubts, the Head Coach of the Sabers had taken up a position nearby.

The man was a few inches taller than Sena, with straight, unkempt gray hair that fell in a messy sweep, held down now by the pair of headphones. His nose was an aquiline beak, lines cutting from the nose and bracketing the thin downturned mouth, running down into the line of his square jaw. More creases ridged his forehead, and cut a deep seam over the top of his nose, between his bushy salt-and-pepper eyebrows; even his thick neck was seamed with a web of wrinkles. His skin was tanned all year round, dark as the sun of a thousand games could scorch it. His light- blue eyes were magnetic and alive, staring from such dark, carved features. He had a whistle on a string, and he twirled it between his long fingers unconsciously as he moved and talked – Sena had never seen him blow it outside of practice, but he kept it with him all the same. He wore a fleece vest in the team colors, with an especially high collar that framed his face and features in cobalt blue, silver and gold.

Sena had never met anyone like the man – brilliant, with several university degrees, but fanatically dedicated to a game that his father used to coach; a man who left business school to take a position as an unpaid worker on a college football coaching staff, because he knew coaching would be his career and not finance; a man who came to Japan after viewing only one of Sena's games, to put him through a workout and gauge his skills, and who taught himself more-than-adequate Japanese (for a gaijin) between the time he entered the American departure terminal and when he landed at Narita International. A man who could reduce 300-plus pounds of gigantic, muscular humanity into sobbing jelly with a word and a frown, and who demanded that the team as a whole make itself available to give out free turkeys to the poor during the American Thanksgiving holiday. His force of personality was almost a visible thing, orbiting his body in shimmering waves – now, he extended that force and wrapped it around Sena.

The field, the noise, the mist… the distracting thoughts – they dissolved. Sena felt like he was standing alone, caught up in the force of that pale gaze. He felt uncomfortable, because he was planning something that contradicted the careful game-planning Coach and his assistants had done over the last several weeks; he was, for the first time, exchanging the team objective for one that he, himself, had created. That was selfishness, on one level, was it not? Despite the best of intentions…?

"I think," the Coach said, eyes shifting as he watched the officials on the field behind Sena's head, "that this kickoff will be decisive in today's game. What do you think, Kobayakawa-san?" His stare, returning to Sena's face, was mildly questioning.

Sena felt his face redden. How could he do this, now… if Coach thought it was so vital, how could he change that plan to suit himself and Shin? "Anno…ah…"

The thin lips turned up, and suddenly the long seamed face seemed humored. "Do you know what an audible is, Sena?"

"When the quarterback understands that the designed play will not work, and defaults to another play; called before the snap by the quarterback, while he is standing behind the center and scanning the defense." He answered automatically, as he'd been trained to do. "All receivers and running backs shift their plans as a result of the audible, and the blocking scheme alters as well. An audible changes everything."

The man nodded, one hard move of his head. "Good. Do you know what it takes to be the player who _calls_ an audible, Sena?"

Sena paused. "The quarterback?"

"The _player_."

"There are other situations when an audible is called?"

The tanned, worn face smiled, revealing perfectly white, fake teeth. "Socratic method, Sena. You are a perfect straight man." His eyes pierced Sena again, delivering a message. "It might be the quarterback who calls an audible most often, 21, but the to be a player that audibles…" His finger, whistle-cord wrapped around it, touched Sena in the center of the chest. "Your coach has to trust your judgment." The mouth reset itself into its normal line. "Do you know why you're here on this team, Sena… why I went to Japan and traveled all those thousands of miles just to get you into this franchise?"

Sena stared. _Where was this going? _"My speed…"

Coach's mouth twitched to the side as he shook his head. One decisive shake. "Nope. I can find speed. I can find agility. I can find just about every physical skill I need right here in the States, or in Canada, or in Europe…" He smirked. "At least, in this hemisphere."

"No, Sena Kobayakawa… I looked at a game film and I saw a tiny little dervish with all the characteristics I cherish – speed, yes…" He jerked his chin in acknowledgement, "… but also, instinct…" his long fingers counted each characteristic as he named it, "… and football smarts, but most of all…" the finger poked Sena again between the numbers. "Most of all, heart. You need to have the balls of a burgler and a will to never quit." His brows rose for emphasis and wiggled his fingers. "It takes all those things to change everything."

_Kami-sama! He __**knows**__!_

"That kind of player has the right type of judgment, Sena-san...even if it's a failure, I'll stick by him, every time." The smile was real, and encouraging. "That guy, he's my guy."

A huge weight was launched from Sena's soul. He nearly bowed. But, the Coach's face settled back into his usual demeanor. "Do your best, son." He said simply, and then turned away. Sena watched as he approached Shin, who inclined his head in respect. Coach leaned close to Shin's ear, and seemed to whisper something. Shin's eyes narrowed, and then opened wide. The two stepped apart, and the Coach offered Shin his hand. Shin grabbed it between both of his, and they stood like that for a moment.

Then, Coach moved on.


	12. Chapter 12

**Kick Off**

The return team for the Boston Sabers took the field.

Jogging across the green turf, the eleven men collected in a loose line that bisected the field at the twenty yard marker before their end zone. The fan noise rose to a crescendo, and camera flashes rippled through the stands like milling swarms of fireflies. Snippets of music and game-related announcements boomed across the super-saturated air, creating odd echoes as the sound waves caromed around the compromised acoustics of the packed building, combining with the existing crowd sounds and the visual chaos of the digital message boards and massive jumbotron into an utterly chaotic tableau: the professional football league championship game.

A feeling of weakness radiated through Sena, out from the center of his body. He paid the sucking void no mind, it was always the same just before game time. As soon as the ball left the kicker's foot, it would be forgotten in the huge adrenalin push and the overpowering need for focus.

Sena jumped in place lightly, attempting to keep his hamstrings loosened. His breathing was loud in his ears; the interior of his helmet was a sauna, and with each breath the edges of his eyeshield fogged over. He watched as the kickoff team for the opponents broke their final huddle, and ran onto the other side of the field, raising their hands and jumping around to encourage their own fans. He took a moment and used his finger to count the number of players – they had eleven players on the field as well. Too few or too many and it was an advantage for the Sabers: either the play ran and Sena's team had an extra blocker, or the officials called a penalty against the kicking team. Sena turned around and counted his own players – no need to give any advantage to the opponent.

No Saber spoke, each readying themselves, working through any last mental checkpoints, wishing for the extreme tension to burst with the kick of the ball. Sena licked sweat off his lips. Double wedge. He flexed his hands in his gloves and shook his arms out. Protect Shin. His eyes flickered across the line of enemy players lined up sixty yards away from him, the kicker in the middle, settling the football on its tee. Almost time. He farted, not even tempted to smile as he usually might have – laser focused. He stared at the enemy players closest to the kicker… one or more of those men would need to be defeated for Shin to reach the end zone. They looked huge, even from so far away. Shin could feel the muscles in his jaw flex, and his stomach clench, and his hands contract into fists – he remembered facing Shin, and Agon, and fox-eyed Shun Kakei and Yamato Takeru and the hundreds of other larger men who had attempted to stop him over the years. Outside the eyeshield, everything started to slow…down…

Sena Kobayakawa stood, body tightened and perfectly balanced, cleats poised astride the chalk hashmarks, and measured his opponents – his wide, unblinking eyes glared out in at the world with an intensity that none could see beneath his mask, while behind that stare his mind, that finely tuned balance of football smarts and experience, weighed everything laid out before him. He saw ghostly paths display themselves across the field and disappear, masses of phantom blockers heaving against each other in scrums across the turf, to dissolve tracelessly. He was attacked in the space between seconds by every variation of his enemy's strength, raging at him with mauling arms extended… to vanish. Sena smiled, eyes gleaming in the dark. _They will not stop me. _That sucking void feeling was gone. The center of his body was radiant with fire and electricity and purpose.

In slow motion, the referee dropped his arm. The shrill sound of the whistle did not reach his conscious mind.

His enemies lumbered forward, taking a part of forever to reach the line of scrimmage. The kicker's foot drifted towards the ball.

The stadium exploded like a volcano of noise. The confluence of emitted light from the cameras in the stands was visible from low Earth orbit, as several satellites registered.

The ball left the tee, rising in a vertical arc through the wet mist.

Sena Kobayakawa blurred.


	13. Chapter 13

**Global Interest I**

Sunday, 9:15 PM, Professional Football League Championship Game, Tampa, Florida, USA – Sports Network Television Broadcast Booth – five minutes before kick-off

"We're just about to go on! Where have you been, Panther?" The No.2 pencil in the producer's mouth was covered with bite marks, and fragments of yellow paint were stuck between her teeth. She brusquely stuck a headphone on his head and clipped a mike to his shirt.

"Hey," said Panther. She raised an eyebrow as he took a wireless microphone out from the pocket of his slacks. "And," he winked, "I'm happy to see you."

She rolled her eyes. "Just sit down, please. Go see Watt." She turned around in the cramped room, filled with broadcast electronics hardware, empty boxes, and people in headphones, wires draped around every empty space like trip-lines. "Someone take our MVP friend to where he is supposed to be…" A young man in ripped jeans and a t-shirt unclipped his headphones from his station and motioned to Panther with a head jerk and quick smile. Spencer followed, weaving his way through the tight quarters until they reached a glassed in area. There were wheeled chairs, and flat screen monitors and an amazing panoramic view of the green field; there was also the smiling face of Jeremy Watt, unwinding his long body in the chair and grabbing for Panther's hand.

"I knew you'd be here, my friend." Watt pushed up his glasses. "Just like on the field, MVP-sama, you can't be stopped."

"_Enough chatter."_ The producer spoke into their headphones. _"The broadcast is being tossed to you in 2 minutes." _

Panther sank into his chair, adjusting his blazer and tie, and settled his headphones into a more comfortable position. He looked at Watt. "You ready, man?"

"Let's go, partner. It's game-time!" The two fist bumped.

"_And… 3… 2…1….we're live!"_

"Konbonwa to our Japanese audience – welcome to tonight's Championship Game! I'm Jeremy Watt, and by my side is a special surprise: it's Patrick Spencer, known the world over as Panther and last year's league MVP! We've got to get right to the game, but any thoughts, Patrick?"

"Thanks, Jeremy. We're in for a fan-tastic match-up between two hungry teams. I've been roving the sidelines looking for the stories real football fans want to hear…"

"_What is he doing?"_ It sounded in the headphones like the producer snapped the pencil in half with her teeth.

Un-phased, Panther continued. "I can tell you this - sources near the Saber's bench have stated that today's game plan calls for a bigger contribution from the veteran presence on the team."

Watt raised both eyebrows, his face twisting into a grin. "And, what does that translate into, Patrick."

Panther leaned forward and smiled, his hands crossing on his lap. "It means, Jeremy, that we need to pay special attention to tonight's kick-off."

"Duly noted. Okay, fans… it's been a soggy day here, but field conditions have improved over the last hour. Oh, the players are moving to their places: we're just about ready to go…"

Panther let Watt continue to set the stage. He saw the players line up on the field, and was surprised by how much he wanted to be one of them – how much he wanted to tear off his fine clothes, suit-up and play with Sena and Shin. He watched as the kicker approached the ball.

"That's it folks, we're underway! The kick is up: this game is on...!"

-

Monday, 11:15 PM; Tokyo Dome City, Japan - Tokyo Dome Hotel

The blue lights of the giant quilted hemisphere captured his eye, squatting outside the north-facing window of Bar 2000 in gigantic repose. He methodically worked his way through his early lunch, a spicy Balinese dish called Jukut Ares – duck soup with banana stems, stopping every now and again to wipe soup from his trimmed beard; he never removed his eyes from the giant stadium limned in sapphire light before him. Tomorrow, the Rice Bowl championship game would be his.

Taro Raimon, known as Monta, one of the most feared American football wide receivers in the Japanese leagues, wiped at his mucus-leaking nose. _Very spicy, that soup._ The amusement park surrounding the Tokyo Dome Hotel was in full swing, even at this hour, with strobing colored lights and tremendous twirling, swinging rides striving to capture his gaze – but still he stared at the curve of the Tokyo Dome. The bar was packed even at this hour before noon, filled with loud conversation and a nicotine cloud, but Monta's was deep in his own head, using agile feet to leaf through the playbook. _The players,_ he thought, should _all be in the common room, for the kick-off of the_… _KICKOFF_??

His cell phone began to vibrate. He blinked once, twice, and then quickly pulled the thing from the pocket of his suit-coat. It was his alarm… set because his best friend was playing football in America _right now_.

He rushed to the bar, using his best receiver-moves to avoid the closely packed crowd. He leaned over the bar, tie dangling into spilled beer, absently plucking a falling bottle of vodka in mid-air from the startled hand of the bartender.

"Change the television channel on every TV. Max change NOW!

_Sorry, Sena… I hope I didn't miss things!_

_-_

Monday, 11:15 AM; Tokyo, Japan - Roppongi

The green and gold sinuous shape of an animated great serpent circled continuously around the emerald script: Club Dragon. The semi-luxurious trappings inside the dim interior of the nightclub mirrored the color scheme, with various patterns of the dragon-color repeated in the silk wall hangings, the faux-leather of the booth-tables, the table cloths, the carpeting, the uniforms worn by the harried servers, and the stiletto go-go boots of the women dancing in cages along the periphery of the large circular room.

Ignoring the frenzied gyrations of the near-naked dancers nearby, a group of young, muscular, tattooed Japanese thugs began to congregate around the 52" plasma in the VIP section of the bar. The huge screen was allowing an amazing view of the two American Football championship contending teams as they continued preparations for kickoff. The camera zoomed in for a close-up of Sena speaking to a tall, gum chewing gaijin on the sidelines with the note "taped earlier" beneath the image. The group, a collection of money-makers for the local Yakuza oyabun, included the usual members of such an illegal clan: drug dealers, pimps, smugglers, and plain strong-arm muscle. They guzzled beer, shochu, whiskey and the specialty drink of the house, the "Dragon Venom Green Death."

"Turn up the sound! It's almost time for kick-off!" One of the toughs yelled. "I want to see Kobayakawa take it all the way! Eyesh!" He reached forward for the remote on the bar – like the lightning strike of a snake, an object somehow navigated through the tiny spaces separating the shifting men, to strike him hard on the temple and dash him bloodily to the ground. A similar blur struck the remote control and destroyed it in a shower of buttons and plastic. A third blur, moving faster than either of the other two, struck the middle of the television, fragmenting the screen and sending pieces whizzing into the ducking group.

After a shocked moment, heads turned to look across the room. "Boss!" the group whispered as one.

Agon Kongo, dressed entirely in white silk, leaned forward in his leather and gold seat with a dangerous gleam in his eyes, a new set of three meditation balls already circling in his big hand. "No one will be watching worthless trashes like those losers today. Not in any of my places. Get on the phone and call every club and gambling hall."

"Yes, Boss!" The men stumbled over each other to do his will.

-

Monday, 11:15 AM; Tokyo, Japan – Metropolitan Police Force Central Command - Kasumigaseki

The sign over the door read "Organized Crime Control Bureau." The Superintendent in charge of the bureau this night was bent over his desk, head in his hands, re-reviewing crime case files related to the recent rise of a powerful and ruthless Yakuza clan leader in the city.

"Keishi?" A sergeant stuck his head into the office and, as a formality, addressed the man by his rank. "Sir, knowing you've been here since yesterday morning, I wanted to extend an invitation – just about every junsa from the overnight shift is at the Shokudo Bar to watch Kobayakawa-san and Shin-san play in the American football championship." Seeing a response at the mention of the names, the sergeant added – "Sir, you played against both men, did you not? When you were the quarterback of the Shinryuji Nagas?"

Unsui Kongo raised his head and rubbed his buzz-cut briskly with a hand. "Yes, junsa-bucho. I played against, and as an ally with, both men during our careers in school… a long time ago." Unsui's mouth curled in a somber half-smile.

"Sir, if I could speak freely…?"

"Please, sergeant."

"Sir, you won't be able to arrest and convict your brother in one day – or even in a week." He paused to gauge his superior's reaction. "Watch the game with us, and return to your efforts tomorrow morning." The man smiled warmly. "Sir, speaking from experience, the change of pace will do you good."

Unsui studied the picture of his brother at the top of the file, closed the folder, placed it in a desk drawer and carefully locked the desk up. "I think that is sound advice. " He stood and stretched, reached for his overcoat and smiled at the older man.

"So, wise sargeant, what do you know about American football…?"

-

Monday, 6:45 AM; 5.2 miles SE of Kandahar, Afghanistan – 3.4 miles E of Pakistani border

The Taliban fighters had awakened them in the early morning dark with a call to prayer. As the orange red sun exploded like a land mine over the scoured, rugged stony hills, the call went out again.

"They'll be coming when they finish with this prayer." Chief Petty Officer Kazuki Jumonji, Japanese Maritime Self-Defense force, Special Boarding Unit (SBU) tactical Team One, assessed, speaking into the boom mike that extended from his ear to in front of his lips. He wiped at his scarred cheek with the filthy back of his hand, smearing the grime on his skin but successfully crushing the tiny insect attempting to burrow into his face. Pursing his lips, he attempted to blow some of the dirt out of the openings on the 30-round magazine of his Howa Type 86 – experience had taught the Chief that even a little grit would jam the feed into the assault rifle. With half-a-hundred mujahedeen in positions nearby, a jam would be fatal.

The Canadian surveyor they were guarding for this U.N. mission lay on her stomach, attempting to shield her electronics gear with her body as she tried desperately to figure out the action on a Beretta Cheetah.380. She had never taken the pistol out of the box, and now the flattened cardboard and plastic packing materials were scattered around and under her. Originally, they had suspected her of being CIA – her unfamiliarity with weapons, and the hysterical weeping that she had not been able to stop since the middle of the night, proved that guess absolutely incorrect.

"Yo, Shozo… any word on the game?" Jumonji, ensconced in a prepared firing position, cast a look over his right shoulder to his radio-man, Petty Officer Third Class (Technical) Shozo Togano. "Kick-off should be starting right about now, right?"

Eyes hidden behind Oakley shooting glasses, Shozo was bent over the digital set, dialing through channels intently. "Hai. That damned station should be…. Ah, there we go! I'll patch it…"

After a moment of static, a soft signal was pushed onto the tac-net: "… _very_ soggy day here, but field conditions…" The signal dropped out, and Togano's swearing could be heard clearly. Then, the signal returned. "…moving into their places: we're just about ready to go…"

Jumonji permitted himself a sigh. _I hope Sena's having a hell of a time…wish I was there to see it. _

A series of ululating cries began to sound from behind the edge of the rocky hill that was framed by his site picture. "Koji, let them have it when I give the word."

Petty Officer Third Class Koji Kuroki acknowledged with a double-click of his transmit key. He was too busy prepping AP shell-loads for the single 107mm mortar detailed for this tactical mission.

The yelling rose to a crescendo, and suddenly the back-fire crack of AK automatic fire rattled and echoed around the hills. The arid, rocky slope before their positions began to puff and crater with mis-aimed impacts. The buzzing sound of ricochets whirring past his ears, Jumonji flicked the selector to three-round with a blackened thumbnail and prepared to return fire.

_Good luck to all of us, Sena._

"…and the kick is up: this game is on...!"

"Team One, weapons free. Weapons free."

-

Monday, 11:16 AM; Tokyo, Japan - Roppongi

"All of you idiots, out!" Agon shoved a handful of girls out of his office and closed the carved mahogany door, using a key from a chain around his neck to lock the door as well.

He turned to his desk and moved behind it, seating himself in an overstuffed chair of brass-studded green leather. He pressed a button on his desk, and a small High Definition television rose from the center of the desk. He pressed the on switch, and after a moment the screen filled with the sounds and sights of American football.

"You trashes…" he hissed.


	14. Chapter 14

**Worst Case**

Slow time, the moment stretttching with crazy elasticity. The hours of training, the years of experience, the muscle memory and quick-twitch fibers tuned to an ultimate, unconscious peak…

The kicker's cleat rose smoothly past the tumbling tee, body levitating above the grass for a fraction of a second with the muscular effort poured into the kick. The ball rose, well struck, punching a tunnel through the humid air as it climbed towards apex, glistening in the lights as water coated its spinning form.

On either side of the green rectangle, the kickoff teams were shifting frantically, bulky assassins stoked with adrenaline and aggression, rocketing towards each other with the kinetic potential of medieval jousters tweaked out on crystal meth. The gunners from the opposition darted down either sideline ahead of the others; the rest of the enemy team formed a loose moving cordon stretched across the breadth of the field – the kicker lagged behind the advancing line, assuming a rear-guard position more suitable for his tackling prowess.

Flashbulbs, a detonation of sound from the vast ring of humanity drowned out by the heavy rhythm of his pounding heart, the woofs of breath from his laboring lungs. Dots of moisture streaked across the surface of his eyeshield as he bolted for his position in front of Shin, coalesced drops falling into his gasping mouth. _Guard. Protect. _In perfect coordination, exactly as drawn up on the white rectangle of the coach's board, the other members of the Saber return team took their planned positions. The more agile men at either end of the larger group detached and went for the gunners, attempting to intercept and impede their progress, block them, drive them out of bounds… any seam, any crease caused by an enemy player being blocked out of position, exponentially increased the chances for a long kickoff return.

Sena reached his spot, legs dancing in place, body vibrating and unable to stay still in the sweep of the moment; his helmet on a swivel, watching the grimacing faces of the enemy eating up the yards as they approached, and then attempting to discern the shadow of the ball traveling through the amorphous, illuminated vapor undulating above his head, and then trying to keep track of the statuesque figure Shin, frozen in concentration, body tense and arms extended, eyes nearly igniting with the concentration necessary to accomplish this task, catching the falling bomb of wet leather.

The Sabers and their opposition made contact, at speed – the heavy air was filled with the car-wreck exclamation of plastic hitting plastic, the meaty slap-thwack of colliding limbs, and the screams, swears and prayers that a war-veteran might dread from his nightmares. No microphone could accurately communicate the cut-throat cacophony to an ear not present on the grass. The gunners and their blockers were engaged to either side of the field and the battle was a draw, no advantage as the men grappled. The initial wedge of Sabers impacted on the moving line of attackers, each man laying hands on his counterpart and attempting to flex the enemy's spine in a direction opposite from what God had intended.

Sena's head swept through its evolution: the return teams were engaged, the descending shape of the ball was growing larger, and Shin was ready to catch it. Everything else, non-pertinent, seemed to phase into grayness.

And again, the sweeping glance: a Saber on the second wedge had lost his footing and the enemy attacker was pushing forward, the ball was almost in Shin's hands. Sena automatically shifted his stance in preparation to block the free man.

Again: the attacker was almost there, just several yard-lengths away, teeth clenched and little streamers of spit being pushed out between them by his desperate lungs, the man's big hands flexing, tape covering the flats of every finger; the ball was nearly in Shin's hands… and a reassuring _thud_ came to Sena's ears, audible above every other noise. Shin had the ball.

Sena exploded into the enemy, a light-speed attack that closed the gap in an eye-blink, catching the man off- balance by its rapidity. The shock of contact translated through the flexing muscles of his arms as his palms impacted the chest of the other player, and his bent his knees and pushed through the engagement with every ounce of power – not a "Spider-poison," Japan-league attack, but very similar. The man shifted backwards, cleats slipping in the wet grass, and Sena worked one hand across the bumpy topology of his chest, managing to get the hand into the player's armpit and grasping his shirt surreptitiously – the leverage of this quasi-legal grip made the opposition player even easier to turn, and Sena took full advantage, redoubling his efforts, his cleats digging trenches in the ground with every push. The man was taller than Sena, but the Saber player's lower center of gravity was a beneficial thing in this situation. The two exchanged grunts, as engaged as two ancient phalanxes might be.

Something changed, in an instant. The enemy player straightened slightly, and his eyes widened as he looked past Sena's shoulder. Sena chanced a peek over his shoulder, then did double take.

The ball was on the ground.

Shin had slipped. Shin had fumbled.

The crowd let out a collective shriek.


End file.
